The pessimists are wrong in my view, but they're not crazy. If technology is purely market-driven and we don't focus innovation on the big inequities, then we could have amazing inventions that leave the world even more divided. We won't improve public schools. We won't cure malaria. We won't end poverty. We won't develop the innovations poor farmers need to grow food in a changing climate. If our optimism doesn't address the problems that affect so many of our fellow human beings, then our optimism needs more empathy. If empathy channeled our optimism, we would see the poverty and the disease and the poor schools, we would answer with our innovations, and we would surprise the pessimists.